sermon
noun · verb
Simple meaning
An address of a religious nature.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
surmuhnSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈsɝmən
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
An address of a religious nature (usually delivered during a church service)
Religious discourse; a written or spoken address on a religious or moral matter.
A lengthy speech of reproval.
verb
To tutor; to lecture.
To discourse to or of, as in a sermon.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- B2 · Upper Intermediate
- Frequency
- Moderately Common
- Typical Use
- Neutral / general English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: An address of a religious nature (usually delivered during a church service)
Used this way, sermon is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. This is a religious use: it carries the weight of tradition and ceremony.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Matter-of-fact
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Where it naturally appears
- Religion/spirituality
- Historical writing
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use sermon
- “The priest gave an inspiring sermon about kindness and forgiveness.”noun
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
The first major discourse delivered by Jesus (Matthew 5-7 and Luke 6:20-49).
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
- preachingnoun
- pastornoun
- reverendnoun
- congregationnoun
- ordinationnoun
- scripturenoun
- hymnnoun
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Sense: address of a religious nature (usually delivered during a church service)
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.